These headlines are being derided by skeptics of the establishment mindset for the cartoonish self-parody of the corporate liberal mindset that they so clearly are, and rightly so. Pretty much everything in American mainstream liberalism ultimately boils down to advancing mass murder, exploitation and ecocide for profit while waving a “yay diversity” banner so that the NPR crowd can feel good about themselves while signing off on it. But the fact that these stories exist and have an audience can also be blamed more specifically on the failures of mainstream feminism.

A lot of men (and the occasional cultishly servile woman) like to bitch about the problem with modern feminism as though it is something that hurts men, threatens men, demonizes men, or robs men of their place in society or anything else they feel entitled to. This is all dopey nonsense which amounts to nothing other than a childish temper tantrum over men losing control over women that they never should have had in the first place; it’s people whining about losing their slaves. That imaginary piffle is not what is wrong with mainstream feminism. What is wrong with mainstream feminism is exemplified perfectly in a mass media parade celebrating the rise of women to the top of the most depraved industry on earth.

The problem that true feminism seeks to address is not that there aren’t enough women at the top of the corporate ladder, or that Americans refused to elect a woman to do the bombing, exploiting and oppressing in 2016. The problem has always been that we’re trying to value women with a value system created by a few very powerful men. By leaving in place the value system created by patriarchy (i.e. capitalism), we are now valuing women but only for their ability to play men’s games. Nobody has ever become a billionaire by being a mother, even the very best mother in the world, and nobody ever will because capitalism was designed by men, for men, to value men’s qualities. This has created a species-threatening imbalance because inequality is baked in to the system. When men reluctantly allowed women out of their house-shaped cages in the sixties, they did so on the condition that they would not change a thing about themselves. Women could play, but it was the women who had to change. As usual.

It’s interesting to go back to seminal texts like Germaine Greer’s “The Female Eunuch” and see how much time feminists spent back then thinking about how women could be paid for domestic and child-rearing work. Fifty years ago, feminists of the time could easily see how financial abuse runs rampant through marriages because women don’t get paid for the majority of their work. They could see how if women were to ever be truly free, that had to be fixed. If you’re not getting paid, then you’re not able to leave, and if you can’t leave, you’re a slave. Despite all of feminism’s gains, today if you dare suggest that women be paid for bearing children, you will be jeered at. It was decided somewhere along the line that, fine, you can be a fake man if you want to, but don’t expect us to value YOU. Men refused to value women’s work, which is why most of it is still essentially slavery. And that was a crucial, planet-threatening mistake.

By refusing to value women and what skills they naturally bring, humanity continued to not value the meta work of the feminine. We continued to not value the health of our environment, the health of our social cohesion, the mental health of each other. By refusing to place a hard and fast value on cleaning, healing, networking, redistributing goods, disappearing problems, restoring, reusing, collaboration, happiness and health, we are strengthening all their opposites.

True Feminism

"Anywhere you see a healthy impulse arising in society, you will see attempts to twist it into the service of power, and this is very much the case with feminism."https://t.co/h64T6ECbbI

Many men will knee-jerk argue that they too are slaves to the corporatocracy, and that’s true. That’s what you get when you don’t change a valuing system that was created by slave-owners to distract their slaves from killing them and to keep them working anyway. That’s what you get when you insist everyone change to suit a system that was created by power to keep power in place. We laugh about how indigenous people were fooled into handing over vast swathes of their land for handfuls of shiny shells, while we hand over our labor, our land, our rights and our freedoms for paper rectangles, today.

True feminism doesn’t hold that the world would be better off if women ran things; shifting control from one gender to the other would change very little as long as the current valuing system remains in place. True feminism holds that all of humanity needs to change its valuing system to one which rewards feminine work as much as masculine, instead of only rewarding women when they succeed at climbing the ladder of the patriarchal paradigm.

Women controlling the military-industrial complex is not feminism, it’s toxic masculinity. It’s the fruit of the sick valuing system that is blackening our air, poisoning our water, filling the oceans with plastic, bulldozing the rainforests, and marching us toward the brink of nuclear armageddon. True feminism means turning away from the toxic valuing system which elevates the most ambitious sociopaths and toward one which values empathy, collaboration, nurturing and peace instead.

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Stephen Morrell/January 8, 2019

To me, this is rather muddled article. Bourgeois feminism has always been concerned with the abstract equality of the sexes, and has a contemporary focus on the ‘glass ceiling’, which is telling for the rest of us in the gutter. The more radical bourgeois feminists, or so-called ‘socialist feminists’, have claimed that capitalism is an inherently ‘male’ economic system with its aggressive competitiveness and ‘winner-take-all’ ethos. And when some women rise to the top of the system it’s claimed they had sold out to the patriarchy, and in fact no longer should be considered women. But to mainstream bourgeois feminists such women are celebrated as examples of the glass ceiling cracking, ‘proving’ that capitalism is finally recognising and using women’s talents.

One of the rallying cries for ‘radical’ feminists has been wages for housework. That this became quite popular in the 1970s isn’t a coincidence. Before then, the (typically) male breadwinner brought home enough income to support a family for the woman to stay at home and be ‘paid’ to endure the stultifying drudgery and isolation of housework and child raising. Women were dependent on the male breadwinner. From the 1970s on, each working class household in most western countries could no longer live on a single income and have a modicum of comfort. This was brought about largely through the rollback of hard-won working conditions (continuing to this day), which began in earnest after the first oil crisis of 1974 with the whittling down of real wages and salaries via a strike of capital that caused simultaneous high inflation and high unemployment (stagflation).

Women consequently were forced to go into the workforce (and were scapegoated for rising unemployment at the same time), but were still expected to continue performing the household drudgery. Today, on average today it takes almost three breadwinners on a median wage/salary for a nuclear family to live above subsistence, yet the most ‘radical’ demand of ‘radical’ feminism remains ‘wages for housework’. That is, be paid to lead a stultifying existence in that modern-day prison house of peoples, the nuclear family. There is a deafening silence from feminism about the nuclear family, the chief prop of women’s oppression.

The main problem with feminism, radical or otherwise, is that it can’t address the material needs of working women and therefore the woman question in its full scope. The woman question is seen purely within the framework of capitalism, and that the main dividing line in society is not a class one but a sex one. Around the time of Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunich (1970), another expression more often was used regarding the woman question: women’s liberation, and there was such a thing called the women’s liberation movement. And this is where the starting point for addressing the woman question should be, but it also indicates the extent of the rightward political trajectory since then that ‘women’s liberation’ is rarely mentioned in political discourse.

Feminism’s roots in the Enlightenment, and the French Revolution, have not extended much further today than advocating equal rights with men. As in Mary Wollstonecraft’s Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792), women’s equality boils down to how well married partners treat each other, plus having the same access to resources and opportunities as men. For working-class women, this boils down to equalising their oppression with working-class men.

The first and most serious effort to conceive of women’s complete liberation was by a male, the utopian socialist Charles Fourier who recognised firstly that liberty can’t occur for anyone living in poverty. Fourier advocated reconstructing society completely to replace the nuclear family, to eliminate the division of labour between men and women. He regarded heterosexual monogamy as an extension of bourgeois property in the sexual sphere, and viewed the patriarchal family as inherently sexually repressive. He advocated the raising of children collectively without particular relation to their biological parents as part of his utopian plalanxes, and was for total sexual freedom. Fourier’s conception of women’s liberation remains just as relevant today as it was in the early 1800s, and Marx and Engels took much from him.

A program for the true liberation of women cannot be limited to what today’s feminists deem fit. It must go beyond feminism because capitalism simply cannot provide the material basis for the liberation of women: socialised housework, restaurants and laundries, free 24-hour childcare, free education, free healthcare (including free access to contraception and abortion) and meaningful work for all. While the nuclear family is a key reproducer of bourgeois authority and values in the domestic sphere, it is also of paramount importance to the capitalist class as it ensures the transmission of property to its heirs. The necessary condition for the liberation of women is the replacement of the nuclear family and that won’t occur without a socialist revolution, which is well beyond the pale for feminism.

Julie Tabler/January 9, 2019

Thanks for some coherent outside-the-box thinking. I decided not to have children in the 80s/90s because the societal support for raising them was ABSENT in every way: material, social & spiritual. Most of my friends were single mothers. It takes a community to raise a child. I was raised in suburbia, in southern California where there were already way too many people. Instead of having children, I was busy doing environmental activism and getting graduate degrees, not to mention having a life full of outdoor activities.

David Byron/January 7, 2019

You should be more careful about posting hate speech like this on facebook as you might get reported for it. And for what? This paragraph detracts from your point and makes you look like a complete asshole. Consider not putting hate speech in your posts please.

“A lot of men (and the occasional cultishly servile woman) like to bitch about the problem with modern feminism as though it is something that hurts men, threatens men, demonizes men, or robs men of their place in society or anything else they feel entitled to. This is all dopey nonsense which amounts to nothing other than a childish temper tantrum over men losing control over women that they never should have had in the first place; it’s people whining about losing their slaves”

Ishkabibble/January 6, 2019

Here’s an observation about feminism and, at the same time, “freedom”. Quite obviously, women are “free” to decide whether they will have any children and, if so, how many. Women’s collective decision is extremely important not only to themselves but to humanity’s future. How important? It is a fact that if the 3.7 billion women of the world, women of all ages, were to for any reason decide to NOT EVER have children, in only 50 years — when new-born girls of today would reach their upper child-bearing age of approximately 50 — humanity’s fate would be sealed. Were women to make that decision today, literally the last person of the present race of 7+ billion human beings would be dead in probably less than 100 years from today. During humanity’s last 100 years of approaching CERTAIN extinction, ALL of humanity’s ongoing environmental impact on the earth, and social effect on each other (especially in densely-packed cities such as Hong Kong), would immediately start to decrease and eventually cease (but of course at least some of humanity’s environmental legacy would remain). .. Now, THAT is what I call “important”! .. “In between” the wildly-expanding economy and population of humanity’s past (and perhaps present, but that remains to be seen) and the hypothetical scenario of women deciding to no longer have children, humanity has LITERALLY UNLIMITED choice about not only the size of its future population, but, infinitely more importantly, the lifestyle humanity is thus allowed or constrained to enjoy and the environmental impact humanity has on the biosphere. .. Whatever you want to call the present economic system (a system in which the vast majority of wealth and large-scale capital equipment is owned or controlled by a microscopic percentage of the population for their own astronimical profit) CAN NOT SURVIVE in a stable or lowering population. For just one example of why this is true, imagine what would happen to the housing industry if it became known that women, en masse, were going to have only one child or no children during their lifetimes. The housing industry would collapse. As the years of lowering population go by, the houses owned by everybody would become less and less “valuable” because the demand for them would constantly be going down. Elderly folks who put their homes up for sale would compete with each other for buyers. It would be the ultimate buyers market. .. Young workers would be in ever-increasing demand. At least theoretically, this would cause employers to compete with each other for workers by raising wages. Just maybe those wages would get high enough so that one of a “couple” could afford to have a child and one of the couple could afford to stay home to take care of that child. .. Well, that rosy scenario ain’t gonna happen if the Elite have any say in the matter! When the people of a society freely decide, for whatever reason, to have one child or no children (future taxpayers/borrowers/debtors/slaves), the Elite order their political slaves to import more people — hopefully, people whose religions declare birth control to be a mortal sin, or the equivalent. In short, the Elite rescind or negate the decision of the women citizens. This Elite strategy is being employed right now in many so-called first-world nations in which women have chosen to have one or no children. .. I recommend to all women to have only one or no children because, ultimately, it is up to women to save humanity from itself. The more that women all over the world can feel “complete” WITHOUT having children, the better off humanity will be, even if whatever you want to call the present system collapses and the Elite take a great big loss on their hundreds of trillions in investments.

Julie Tabler/January 7, 2019

Julie Tabler/January 7, 2019

I had noticed that the current economic model would NOT accommodate a decreasing population. You explain it well, I think. Your take on the strategy of the power elites does account for why there is a war on women’s rights, women’s health, and women’s earning power, even though most women and most men in this society support all those things.

The worst offenses I’ve seen are in the medical system. It is pretty unconcerned with illnesses that affect mostly women, such as autoimmune illnesses, thyroid disease, myalgic encephalomyelitis (renamed chronic fatigue syndrome to make it a wastebasket category), fibromyalgia, and others. The only other category of people who’ve had their illnesses shoved under the rug are veterans with Gulf War Syndrome, which didn’t happen only in the Gulf War. This means the military is hiding something (hint: experiments involving toxic exposure, both in vaccines and biowarfare agents).

Rob/January 6, 2019

What is implicit in Caitlin’s critique of modern feminism is that women are innately more caring and less aggressive, less competitive and less violent than men. If some women exhibit the innate traits of men, it is because they are compelled to by the economic and social systems that have been created by men. As evidence of this thesis, Caitlin offers nothing except her own intuition.

Perhaps the case is somewhat different. Perhaps there is a spectrum of aggressiveness and competitiveness that exists both in men and women, ranging from extremely gentle and caring to aggressive and even psychopathic, and it is those who reside on the aggressive end who tend to rise to the tops of the power structures in which they function. If this is the case, then women who succeed in the world of men are not simply mimicking men to advance their careers, they are expressing their own true selves.

And perhaps both theses can be correct at the same time. On average, women may tend towards the caring end of the spectrum, but those who are by temperment at the aggressive end are the ones who achieve the greatest success in competitive environments.

gepay/January 6, 2019

What i don’t understand is what other economic systems are there than capitalism. What system did the Roman Empire use? What system did older Chinese civilisation use? The middle ages in Europe used the feudal system. Were these better for women? it seems clear to me that birth control is what made it possible for feminism to become more influential. It would seem to me that throughout history, cooperation between men and women was essential for raising families in this often harsh and cruel life.

In Dickensenian England, we have: “It was all Mrs. Bumble. She would do it,” urged Mr. Bumble; first looking round, to ascertain that his partner had left the room.

That is no excuse,” returned Mr. Brownlow. “You were present on the occasion of the destruction of these trinkets, and, indeed, are the more guilty of the two, in the eye of the law; for the law supposes that your wife acts under your direction.”

If the law supposes that,” said Mr. Bumble, squeezing his hat emphatically in both hands, “the law is an ass — an idiot. If that’s the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is, that his eye may be opened by experience — by experience.”

so apparently women can have power even in the patriarchal tyranny of capitalistic England. Most men are just as oppressed as most women. Some of them take it out on their women because women are as a rule less physically imposing – not a manly way of acting. I was a house husband because my wife could make much more money easier than I could. How many arguments still came down to: “I make the money.” Plus que la change, plus que la meme chose

jeff montanye/January 6, 2019

perhaps not valuing women and their natures when capitalism evolved a bit to allow them employment will turn out not to be planet threatening after all. the reaction of women to this has been a plunging birthrate and, within a generation, peak human population. afterward the population declines without a clear limit.

Bruce Berry/January 5, 2019

I can’t help but think that monetizing motherhood is the final (and fatal) phase of a capitalist system. Totally agreed that we need to value those domestic activities – value in the sense of everyone acknowledging their true worth to society. The biological imperative means that men and women will never have the same tasks required of them, but surely the way forward is to unwind the almost complete monetization of family life, rather than complete it?

Carey/January 6, 2019

I think that likelier than not “patriarchy-hating” “Caitlin Johnstone” is a Five Eyes Operation. “She”, oddly or not, never mentions how one might fight said “patriarchy”, or mentions the word “class” in this missive… there are as many, *just as many*, badly-behaving women as there are men, with their own issues and axes to grind, thank you very much. Quite curious to see who exactly is going to battle this mythical “patriarchy”, and more interesting still, to whose benefit…

Julie Tabler/January 6, 2019

Indeed! My question: Is that already starting? Decentralizing currency creation — as in cryptocurrencies — seems to represent a paradigm shift. What else? The knowledge economy? There is no scarcity there. You can’t “use up” knowledge; you can just find different ways to use it. What else?

edding/January 7, 2019

She is talking about value systems, not something inherent in men or women- i.e. she describes a value system that corrupts- one that those women who wish to ‘succeed’ in the MIC adhere to- vs. “a value system based on the health of our environment, the health of our social cohesion, the mental health of each other. By refusing to place a hard and fast value on cleaning, healing, networking, redistributing goods, disappearing problems, restoring, reusing, collaboration, happiness and health, we are strengthening all their opposites.”

I think it’s pretty clear, and certainly sensible. No need to get defensive about it.

Mary Wildfire/January 5, 2019

Agreed, in the general principle. But I see a major flaw in the assumption that the qualities our culture calls “masculine” are inherently and universally male, and that the “feminine virtues” are inherently attached to women. Other cultures assign different attributes and proclivities to the genders. Interesting take on this is Carol Flinders’ Rebalancing the World. In a nutshell, she theorizes that once the values we call female were universal, but that with agriculture, then cities and hierarchy, came situation that called for “masculine values”–and the way the culture dealt with it is to assign the old values to women and then assign top status and dominance to men and their new values…which also throws a sop to the men who are now in subordinate positions to other men, in that they can dominate their families. I think men actually are more oppressed than women, because women have thrown off most of the bullshit that hampered them, while men are barely making a start in refusing the sex roles that restrict them. Most of the men who talk about a men’s movement aren’t talking about that–they’re whining about bad divorces.

Julie Tabler/January 6, 2019

What you say ties in to Daniel Quinn’s thesis that it was when humans started producing food surpluses that war became inevitable and patriarchy was born, along with hierarchies of different roles people played. Agriculture was already a human practice at that point, but the food surpluses created the possibility (and perceived need for) a standing army.

LuzMilagrosMamaWolf/January 5, 2019

Caitlin, my soul just gave you a standing ovation! This article so perfectly expresses how I have felt for so long. Thank you for bringing to light how being a feminist doesn’t mean castrating men, so women can take their place in destroying the world as good as any guy can. Feminism in the New Epoc empowers women’s to be proud of our nutrurence, cooperative, creative, flowing natures and not molding ourselves to a patriarchal ideal (as in Hillary Clinton cackling “We came. We saw. He died.). Brava dear soul! Brava!

Caitlin’s essay is excellent, IMO, although there may be a concern about her favoring revolution over incrementalism. For me, an impatience that insists on immediate, total revolution too often leads to violence and a failure to achieve overall improvement, The Napoleonic Code was a step in the right direction (better social justice), but that step was made possible by the preceding Reign of Terror. The downside of the 1789 French violence was that it inured many consciences against caring for underdogs—womankind, poor and powerless people in general, and darker-skinned people.

SteveK9/January 5, 2019

I see a lot of bitching, but not much that I can recognize as a suggested alternative. How about even one or two actual real changes you would like to see implemented as a start on making a new system. How about some focus on actual problem-solving, as opposed to wishing for a magic wand that would transform everything … to what exactly??

P.Brooks/January 5, 2019

D. Bruce Turton/January 5, 2019

From some of the comments so far, I can only subscribe to the truth of the statement from the 1970’s that “the personal is political”. Those holding so vehemently to the primacy of patriarchy, formulated in various political and personal covenants and liturgies that hail from the latest couching of patriarchal power relations in our over-arching capitalist systems, still heed the call to prevent any efforts to remediate their identity, their very “souls”. Thank you and amen to your fabulous article. P.S. Maggie Thatcher, for all her failings, did advocate that global warming causing climate disruption was real and was dangerous. Not that any of her policies did a damn thing about it though!

One reason why we have a few money lenders and landlords running the whole world, with the rest of us toiling as serfs to pay their monthly dues to them, is because we have no real inkling of how we would live without them.

And the difference is so enormous, that one shies away from speaking of it, for fear of being condemned as a foolish Utopian.

But here are a few characteristics of a Usury free society with a liberated Commons and current technological levels. This is how we would live, WITHOUT USURY, without the landowners, without the speculators. Without the parasites who add nothing, and have everything:

– A man would work a maximum of 15 weeks per year to provide for his/her family.

– Self Employment and Small Business would be the norm.

– Men and women would see stress levels decline dramatically. They would spend far more time with each other, their children, their families, and their friends or in spiritual and creative pursuits that they are drawn towards.

– By far most people would live a very comfortable middle class existence. There would still be a few rich people, but they would be much less rich, and not able to dominate society because of their wealth.

– Building would see costs decline by 80 to 90% (!). An architectural revival and boom of uncanny proportions can be expected.

– Every man and his family would have access to decent land and living and working space at very low cost. By far most people would own some land, but vast landholdings would no longer exist, because there would be no renting.

– Food production would be heavily decentralized, and many families would grow at least some food themselves. Food quality would improve incredibly.

– Poverty would end. There would still be differences in class, but they would be more about genetics and intelligence and not about wealth. But there would be no disenfranchized underclass, and only the most problematic people would be unable to join the general well being. The barbarization of the poor would end, and a great emancipation of those now oppressed by Usury and wage slavery will result.

– There would be no Big Pharma (owned by the Banks) to war on Natural Health. Combined with low stress and excellent nutrition, health, both physical an psychological, and longevity would grow substantially. Substance abuse would decline.

– There would be no Trillions for the Plutocrats to fund all these problems aimed at distracting us and centralizing power. No Migration, no Climate Change, no Bankers orchestrating all their enormous wars. There would be no funding for endless fake news, bogus ‘science’, manufactured ideologies aimed at dividing people.

– Families and local communities will have plenty of funding for their own needs, though.

– General corruption levels would decline immensely.

– There would be still inequality, but based on merit, and added value, not on property. Hard work and wisdom would be rewarded. Wealth inequality levels would be far lower, though. What is more, money will no longer be the main driver of status. Aristocracy will be based on service. On spiritual and intellectual depth, not on the acquisition of treasure.

– The State could decline very seriously in scope and impact, returning to its basic jobs of providing a basic legal system and defense, not endless nannying and other massive overreaches. Although this remains an important issue in itself. National Socialism, for instance, created a massive totalitarian State supposedly to ‘fight unearned income’ and ‘provide for the citizenry’. But the real aim and focus of economic decentralization is to promote autonomy and economic independence for the common man. This is the core issue. When this goal is achieved, nobody will need a big State to depend on.

– And there is of course Lietaer’s question: ‘What would the Cathedrals of the 21’st Century look like?’. With interest-free lending, major, very long term investments become viable again. It took European cities a century to build a cathedral, back in the days of the Usury-free Catholic economy. What would people build today, if they had a hundred years to create it?

This is what is at stake, and this is what they have stolen from us. This is how we would live, without Usury, without the landowners, without the speculators. Without the parasites who add nothing, and have everything. Without their silly ‘making money with money’ schemes, which have no other purpose than exploiting the toil of the masses, aka Capitalism.

Note that for all this no ideology is needed. Just the acceptance of reality: that money does not grow automatically in a bank account, and that only labor creates wealth.

inforebelscum/January 6, 2019

Daniel, an outstanding take! And I applaud your courage to point out the one single most destructive force that needs to be forever banished from humanity – Usury. Don’t be surprised though if you “wake up dead”. If there is one thing TPTB must defend at all costs it is Usury, the basis of all their power.

I have been patiently engaging the readers here to describe what exactly will the revolution be about and what comes after it. So far you are the only one to respond with an actual understanding of the real cause of troubles and a plan to address it. My only disagreement with you is that it is not capitalism but corporatism that is the current system.

Karen and Jeff Hay/January 5, 2019

Much of what’s wrong with Mainstream Feminism, or in this case non-mainstream) is exemplified in Caitlin’s recent article regarding female orgasm . Karen and I made this comment about oneof the statements she made in that article…. Jeff and Karen Hay Dec 5, 2018 Aloha Caitlin, in your article you state “Making himself desirable means making sure that there are no pressing financial or domestic concerns, because female sexuality, tied as it is to her reproductive system, tends to shut down when her life isn’t at the level of stability and abundance you’d want if you were going to bring a baby into the world.” Since here in the US over 60% of people can not afford a $500 emergency it’s safe to say the that no women in that place of instability and lack of abundance will be desiring sex. In fact that level of stability and abundance is probably only achieved by those in the top 5% or so of income earners.

F. Foundling/January 5, 2019

I agree with much of what the article says, including the theses that domestic and child-rearing work should be paid and that the burden of unpaid domestic and child-rearing work impedes the self-realisation of women, as well as their opportunities to have the types of career (be they noxious or beneficial) that are valued in the current social system. To this, I would add that much of this work can be minimised and greatly alleviated or simply taken over by professionals in social services, if those are provided by the state and made affordable – a cause that modern mainstream feminism does not sufficiently emphasise, opting to spend, instead, a lot of its energy on divisive and counterproductive symbolic controversies and, in some cases, unjustified demands that are likely to be useful only to a minority of women. I also agree that, in general, the current social values and the qualities rewarded by them (such as what it takes to run the military-industrial complex) are, to an extent, noxious, and need to be replaced by beneficial ones.

My main disagreements have to do with the apparent assumption of enormous and perhaps biologically immutable mental and behavioural differences between men and women with great socio-economic and ethical relevance and implications.

One aspect that I find problematic is that the article seems to be describing the qualities associated with the current unequal social system as being self-evidently ‘men’s qualities’ and their desired replacements as being ‘naturally’ women’s qualities. Since, as the article points out, the qualities rewarded by the current system are to some extent noxious, sometimes to the point of sociopathy, that would seem to entail that men are, generally, noxious, relatively inclined to sociopathy and morally inferior to women. This is a problem, since, if this noxiousness and this inferiority are innate, that would entail permanent inequality between the genders, and even if they are acquired, it would at least entail temporary inequality between them. It would also mean that it is difficult to expect men to collaborate with women in the dismantling of the current noxious system, especially if it is just a natural emanation of their own inherent noxious qualities.

Apart from the implications, I am just not convinced that the posited association of qualities with gender is factually true. First, to take some of the specific qualities/practices mentioned, ‘networking’, ‘disappearing problems’ and ‘collaboration’ are constantly practiced by men very efficiently – not necessarily always for humane purposes – within the current system, as is health work, sometimes very lucratively. Second, and much more crucially, I don’t have the impression that women are generally more humane, solidary, egalitarian and less ambitious, competitive and malevolent than men; the servility and conformity instilled in them by patriarchy are actually rewarded in corporate settings.

In general, I don’t think that women are somehow inherently less capable of success in the current social system than men are; the abovementioned burden of unpaid work is a sufficient explanation for the existing disparity between the genders. The system does, to an extent, favour indidiuals with noxious characteristics, some of which could be referred to as sociopathy, but these characteristics are not less possible to exhibit for women than they are for men, and the increasing presence of women in leadership positions in the current structures of exploitation and empire bears witness to that.

A related aspect is that by making the elevation of the status of women conditional on the elevation of the status of the domestic and child-rearing work done by them, the article seems to presuppose that domestic and child-rearing work will always (perhaps due to biological predisposition) be associated with women. Apart from the actual pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding I don’t think that biology predetermines anything here: most domestic and child-reading work can and should be performed by men just as much as by women, and conversely, most types of work traditionally performed by men can and should be performed successfully by women just as well as by men. However critical I am of the current system, I think that much of the know-how that was originally acquired and used by men is valuable for humans in general, it’s perfectly good for women, too, and it can and should be successfully practiced by women, because in the end of the day, *men and women just aren’t all that different*. In fact, these originally male ‘games’ that can be engaged in just as well and successfully by women as by men include the writing of articles and political and philosophical discussions, as seen on this site.

Bravo Caitlin! Just Bravo! You are one of the most sane voices out there, not fooled by the sophisticated brainwashing techniques of mainstream culture and media. It is really an honour and a pleasure to read your sane and unique voice. THANK YOU

If you’d like to read another very insightful and profound blog that sees through all the smoke and mirrors and cuts right to the core of our culture and economy, then I highly recommend checking out https://coloradopublicbanking.blogspot.com/

inforebelscum/January 5, 2019

“…value system created by patriarchy (i.e. capitalism)…” “…redistributing goods…”

And there is the confession: feminism is about socialism and not about bettering the “plight” of women. Which is exactly what feminism was designed to do, further the cause of socialism for the benefit of TPTB. Flooding the market with more workers (women) drove wages down making maintaining a traditional single earner household almost impossible without going into debt that otherwise could and might be avoided. TPTB win. Women working outside of the home instead of raising and nurturing their children caused innumerable social problems as well. TPTB win again. Etc. Exactly as planned. What feminists fail to grasp is that women did have real tremendous power before “woman liberation”. The hand that rocked the cradle and all of that. So now feminists measure woman power using the “evil capitalist system” of reducing everything down to a dollar amount. But what a homemaker does is literally priceless*. Feminism convinced women to give up their real value and sublime power for a common paycheck. Becoming another tax slave for TPTB is hardly a step forward for women and society, me thinks**.

But the real revelation is this: “When men reluctantly allowed women out of their house-shaped cages…”

So instead of a woman being appreciative of the roof over her head provided by a man working his ass off to provide that roof and the bacon for her and their children feminism teaches women to be perpetually ungrateful and hateful towards men because men have the audacity to expect the woman to fry that bacon up in a pan. Oh the horror, the horror… To feminists a home is a cage because the three pillars of feminism are hate men, blame men, and the refusal to be feminine.

*Feminists want wives to be paid for doing housework but they never say who is supposed to pay – the husband? The government? Where is the money supposed to come from?

**Modern women will be cursed for their shortsightedness by future generations of women because that power will take a long time for women to get back if ever.

May I also suggest that, our current experience is simply a continuation of patriarchy over millennia.

There was a time on our planet when there were only female gods, embodying both the masculine and feminine principles, however with the warring tribes ‘arriving’ (I won’t say more than that!), we have an established system of patriarchy in all aspects of society that is left brained and the antithesis of how women typically think and behave which is more right brained: the creative, compassionate (genius-oriented!) side of the brain.

For women to ‘break free’ in the workplace, for example, we need to completely dismantle all of our patriarchal societal structures, as everything has been ‘built’ by men, for me, ie; according to their personal ‘operating system’, so that the only way women can attempt to succeed within current paradigms, is by conforming within their system.

Whilst we may break free occasionally and exceptionally, for this to be sustainable, the whole left-brained, patriarchal, structural, systemic way of life on earth (for the most part) needs to be removed and upgraded to the more balanced left and right brained paradigm – where both have a place and both can thrive.

This is why our current Phoenix style worldly break downs serve a purpose so we can review and recreate what serves the whole, including women and where we can re-establish balance and harmony across the globe.

We are in the process of doing that, however I suggest it is best done with wisdom, knowledge and grace and not brute force or aggression – following the philosophies of the ancient Eastern martial arts – flowing with and adapting the energies of change to remodel our reality in a way that functions holistically for all.

inforebelscum/January 5, 2019

May I also suggest that, our experience is simply a continuation of patriarchy over millennia.

There was a time on our planet when there were only female gods, embodying both the masculine and feminine principles, however with the warring tribes ‘arriving’ (I won’t say more than that!), we have an established system of patriarchy in all aspects of society that is left brained and the antithesis of how women typically think and behave which is more right brained: the creative, compassionate (genius-oriented!) side of the brain.

For women to ‘break free’ in the workplace, for example, we need to completely dismantle all of our patriarchal societal structures, as everything has been ‘built’ by men, for me, ie; according to their personal ‘operating system’, so that the only way women can attempt to succeed within current paradigms, is by conforming within their system.

Whilst we may break free occasionally and exceptionally, for this to be sustainable, the whole left-brained, patriarchal, structural, systemic way of life on earth (for the most part) needs to be removed and upgraded to the more balanced left and right brained paradigm – where both have a place and both can thrive.

This is why our current Phoenix style worldly break downs serve a purpose so we can review and recreate what serves the whole, including women and where we can re-establish balance and harmony across the globe.

We are in the process of doing that, however I suggest it is best done with wisdom, knowledge and grace and not brute force or aggression – following the philosophies of the ancient Eastern martial arts – flowing with and adapting the energies of change to remodel our reality in a way that functions holistically for all.

Darr/January 5, 2019

Good article, Caitlin….It reminds me of the particular revulsion I’ve always felt for women like hillary… madeline albright… condi rice… samantha powers…nikki haley etc. After all, are they not just self-loathing females fighting for a place at the men’s war mongering table where war and other atrocities are planned out in advance ? What life affirming nurturers ! So inspiring ! { Sarcasm } There needs to be a marriage between the women’s / mothers movement and the anti-war crowd. What could be accomplished if half the world’s population {women} joined arms to demand that respect for life { instead of contempt } be shown for the product of their biological mandate … that is, their collective offspring .. {?} Perhaps the deserved equality women seek will only arrive when they truly stand up for the most vulnerable, that is, all humans in general.

David Syme/January 5, 2019

‘True feminism means turning away from the toxic valuing system which elevates the most ambitious sociopaths and toward one which values empathy, collaboration, nurturing and peace instead’. So true!

But, This silly debate is Western ephemerata at its most toxic. Have they stopped burning Indian women yet? Genital mutilation? Child brides? Thats worth fighting against If you travel/live in non-gentile countries, there is a much more natural, accepted balance. And its not all capitalism’s fault, (alleged) witches in ‘the good old days’ have a story

anne parrotta-rinaldi/January 5, 2019

JM/January 5, 2019

Greg Stebel, the reason you feel so protective of capitalism — which rewards people for men’s work — is because you have never been a mother, never sacrificed everything you have in order to serve others. This is very real and economically valuable work, but the mechanism for valuing her work in a capitalist system is broken. Without women, the human species dies. Without women, there would be no “great men,” both because it’s a woman who gives life to all people, and because women free up a man’s time — since he doesn’t have to bear, nurse, and care for his children — so that he can pursue his passions and interests and create “great things.”

It is also true that capitalism was designed by men and for men in order to value what men possess (capital, since women were legally prevented from owning capital throughout much of human history; and wage-earning capabilities, since men could pursue outside interests as women tended to domestic needs). It’s not a coincidence that teachers and nurses are paid less than firefighters and police officers, even though the “women’s jobs” require a much higher level of education, and often involve taking real physical risks, as well. —————– Women are indeed more nurturing and less physically competitive than men. If we weren’t, humans wouldn’t exist. Women are biologically hard-wired to value their offspring more than men because women are far, far more invested in the survival of their children. Men can have hundreds of children and never know of a single one; they can have multiple children at a time from multiple women, and never suffer any pain or risk to their lives in order to procreate. This is why men tend to allow their children more freedom (which is healthy), since they can almost always make more children. A woman’s ability to have more children involves much more sacrifice, and even then, women have a very narrow window during which they can physically bear children. This is not to say that men are never more nurturing than women, but in the aggregate, it is women who will sacrifice more and give more to their children. By the way, this is “working for somebody else,” and women work 24/7 for their husbands and children, often giving up their jobs, hobbies, their own names, social networks, and their ability to sustain themselves in order to provide for others. Your assumption that “men work for others while women work for themselves” proves Caitlin’s point. The fact that women aren’t paid for their work in a capitalist system makes you think that it is less valuable that traditional “men’s work.” That is precisely what needs to change. —————- Additionally, while you might think that capitalism has raised living standards around the world, it has also caused deprivations that offset these benefits. Because of capitalism, indigenous/native people lose the rights to their land, their homes, and their natural resources; people are enslaved and sold or used for profit; and people lose control over their own lives as they are forced to give their labor, time, and livelihood to others in order to earn fiat (capitalist) money that they need to simply pay for the right to have access to shelter, water, food, and other basic necessities. We are the only animals on the planet who need to do this — this system is specifically designed to exploit less powerful people, forcing them to hand over their natural rights to resources (including their own time and labor) to those same capitalists. Like the Chinese farmers who’ve moved to the cities to supposedly improve their lives, many people are waking up to the fact that they are really giving up control over their time, life, and resources under the globalist-capitalist system of exploitation.

JoeSixPack/January 5, 2019

“Women are indeed more nurturing and less physically competitive than men. If we weren’t, humans wouldn’t exist.”

This is absolute nonsense. Women are not more nurturing and not less physically competitive then men . There is no scientific evidence that supports that. There is ample evidence of women being more physically competitive then men and men being as nurturing or more so than women. You are stuck in a very ’50s mind set of stereo typical gender roles. Free your mind.

anne parrotta-rinaldi/January 5, 2019

JM/January 6, 2019

Not sure where you’re getting your “evidence,” but I’ve yet to see any scientific studies, or even anecdotal evidence, that would prove your assertion. On the other hand:

“Agreeableness

Replicating previous findings, there was a significant gender difference in Agreeableness such that women tend to score higher than men, and this pattern was the same for the aspects, Compassion and Politeness, when measured in terms of raw scores or residualized scores. Compassion most clearly represents a tendency to invest in others emotionally and affiliate on an emotional level, encompassing traits such as warmth and empathy. Politeness describes the tendency to show respect to others and refrain from taking advantage of them, and is related to traits such as cooperation and compliance. Our findings that women score higher than men on both aspects are consistent with previous research showing women are more trusting and compliant than men (Costa et al., 2001).”

JM/January 6, 2019

Inforebelscum, it’s obvious that men are needed to procreate, but fewer males than females are needed to maintain a population. Additionally, if women were not there to feed and care for their children, then the infant/child mortality rate would increase, eventually resulting in a declining population (which would happen as a result of the lack of females in the first place).

But I’m not arguing that males are unimportant, and I don’t think that Caitlin is doing so, either. What constantly gets lost in these conversations is that people like myself are not attacking males, we are simply stating that the unpaid work that females traditionally do is every bit as important as the wage-earning work that men do. We need an economic system that reflects this fact, because our current capitalist system is incapable of doing so.

inforebelscum/January 6, 2019

JM, agree that it is a natural balancing act this dance of men and women. I am only pointing out that feminism rejects the notion of Nature’s balance.

“…unpaid work that females traditionally do is every bit as important as the wage-earning work that men do.”

Completely disagree. The unpaid* work that women do is far more important i.e. raising children. And society used to recognize that until feminism was invented by TPTB.

Because assigning a dollar value to such priceless sacrifice by women is impossible Western Civ established some norms to show its appreciation of women and motherhood. This is where the customs arose of standing up when a woman walked in a room, or men tipping their hats, or men sacrificing themselves for “women and children first”, or men not using rough language around women, etc. These are acts of respect and admiration for women in general but Homemakers in particular. Until feminism taught women that it is demeaning to be thought of as anything other than equal to men.

*Homemakers are paid through the husband’s wages just not directly so the notion that housework is done for free is nonsense.

F. Foundling/January 5, 2019

I agree with the criticism of capitalism, but I disagree with the claim that women are biologically hardwired to serve, sacrifice and perform domestic work and consider their evopsych explanations speculative. This has the reactionary and inegalitarian implication that women must continue to serve, sacrifice and perform domestic work more than men. Work should be rewarded justly, thus it shouldn’t constitute a ‘sacrifice’. Domestic work is relatively unspecialised and uncreative, and women should neither be confined to it nor burdened with a greater share of it than men are.

I don’t think it’s accurate to claim that mothers ‘sacrifice everything you have in order to serve others’; they simply do the work that society expects them to do, for the price that society places on that work. Within these conditions that they have not chosen by their own will, they are as ambitious and competitive, and as eager to pursue their own advantage as the next person. Serving others is an investment, and the ‘others’ can be part of a collective entity on behalf of which one exercises selfishness and narcissism in the same way as one would on one’s own behalf. Mothers are not some kind of saints.

JM/January 6, 2019

Your argument completely ignores the very real role of biology. Domestic work is indeed specialized; it is only women who can bear and nurse children. And the extent of creativity and participation involved is determined by the individual, not the job category. Additionally, it is not society that pays women, and that’s precisely the point of this article and my comments. Nobody is paying them for their work, which is the very problem that is noted here.

As to the question of whether or not a mother sacrifices everything for her family (particularly those mothers who do the majority of unpaid “women’s work”), you would only say what you’ve said if you’ve never been a full-time caregiver. Most women who are full-time caregivers have also worked full-time outside of the home. Since they have experience in both positions, they are the ones who can accurately describe the relative burdens and rewards of the different types of work.

Greg Strebel/January 6, 2019

JR, capitalism rewards those (men and women) who provide value to others, not to men alone. Unfettered capitalism, through competition, ensures that the biggest variety, largest range of choice offerings of goods and services are available to people holding a spectrum of values.

I already described the transition of the provider role, a simple concept which provided a survival advantage for much of history. This was not some kind of plan for the exclusive benefit of males. Your interpretation that women ‘work for others’ in devoting time as mothers rearing children can be acknowledged by accepting that historically parents depended on their children for support in their dotage, however “you can’t get there from here” if someone is not out putting food on the table and a roof over the heads until the next generation is able to undertake the tasks of procuring and adding value to resources. As I stated, the slave concept no longer applies, if it ever did. People who choose to have children are committing to devote time/resources to their rearing, but it is a choice. They are doing it for themselves, for the rewards they feel it brings. It is a decision a couple makes, husband and wife together, as is the decision as to who will be the major breadwinner should they mutually decide whether one of the two stays at home. Money is a tool which enables efficient exchange compared to barter. Exchange is an essential means of benefiting from ‘division of labour’. Fiat money is a tool of a very select minority to profit (unduly) from the labour of others via the ability to conduct what is essentially legalized counterfeiting. It is used by virtually every system of government to opaquely transfer value from the general population to the favoured few. It is not unique to capitalism. And evidently, it is necessary to explain that capitalism is simply the application of resources to the creation of capital stock ie those assets which are designed to create more goods and services. Capitalism employs the concept of delayed gratification. An example prototype would be the fisherman who works longer hours to spear a surplus to carry through a period while he/she devotes time to carry out the innovation of weaving a net. The surplus could equally be available, through agreement, to another individual who has an analogous innovative idea. As the technological progress based on this foundation continues, we end up here, in our extraordinarily complex society with an unimaginably improved quality of life. Which not to say that it is anywhere near optimum, given the existence of a corrupt and criminally exploitative. Like everything, capitalism can be and is being perverted, to the advantage of the connected few and the segment of the population employed by these few to secure and extend their sinecure, namely the state security apparatus, the military, the bureaucrats, the academics and ‘think tanks’ giving intellectual ‘justification’ for state impositions and extractions, and functionaries and all others whose presence is determined by diktat. Your whole male vs female and patriarchal paradigm thesis is analogous to the Democrat vs Republican conflict of ideas. These are distractions from the real issues of challenging the ‘power elite’ who own/manage the corporations and state enterprises and apparatus that exist to entrench power and extract wealth from producers. There is no appreciable difference between Democrats and Republicans in actuality. GWB’s promise of a humble foreign policy did not last a year, Obama’s Hope & Change was false hope and more of the same. Similarly, the incumbent is not demonstrating a deviation from accommodating the financial and military industries. This is certainly obvious from the moment one sees tabulations of the sources of campaign donations and the selection of military, security agency and Wall Street personnel for the heads of federal departments and key advisory positions.

The ‘Deep State’ or ‘power elite’ or whatever you want to call the people who actually prescribe policy and call the shots, domestically and internationally, are not just delighted to see people such as yourself preoccupied with divisive and distracting issues, they actually promote the memes and paradigms that you adopt or you revile in others. Divide and conquer, bread and circuses, “Look, a squirrel”, etc, all to the purpose of distracting you from scrutinizing them, and the policies and actions that secure and enrich them, at our cost, in wealth and liberty.

The puerile discussion regarding indigenous people also calls for a response. There are few exceptions to the observation that assemblages, of what are now called indigenous peoples, lived at subsistence levels. The vagaries of nature meant life was often “nasty, brutish and short”. Jarod Diamond reports that inter-tribe conflict resulted, on average, in one percent death rate per year. Attributing subjugation of indigenous peoples to capitalism is uninformed. It was clearly military colonialism. A better example of capitalism is the shirt factory established in, for example Haiti. Those employed as a result of an entrepreneur’s investment there are unequivocally better off. To assume they are being exploited to their disadvantage assumes that they have better options but do not avail themselves of those better options. It is illogical and condescending to assume that people are not making the decisions they think are best for themselves. Between my wife and me, we have 12 siblings, several married to Status Indians and with children holding that status, totalling more than a dozen “Indians” by official status and a couple more who chose not to seek official status recognition. You are telling me nothing new about how hard some mothers work, and I can tell you that not a single one of my indigenous relatives would abandon the amenities of modern life for subsistence living and inter-tribal conflict.

Take off the blinders and get out of the rut. You are not going to fix the problem of sociopaths running the system by misconstruing the evolution and current construction of society. You have a standard of living and options that 99% of people in all of world history could not hope for. That is despite the machinations of the power elite. Exposing them and constraining their power will result in a quantum advance for quality of life for people everywhere. Peace.

inforebelscum/January 6, 2019

Greg, another excellent take. For some reason leftists simply cannot understand context. They tend to see the world as “right now” without any attempt to understand history especially through the eyes of those who lived it. IOW child-like thinking with childish emotions.

Bonnie Camo MD/January 5, 2019

I was a feminist in the 1970s when I was in medical school. The women’s movement gave me the confidence to try. I totally agree with everything you so eloquently said. I thought feminism was about respecting women’s natural virtues – gentleness, cooperation, caring – needed to ensure the survival of the next generation. It never should have been about becoming like a man to fit into the patriarchal capitalist dominance hierarchy.

Greg Strebel/January 5, 2019

I concur with your contention that making to the top of the MIC corporate ladder is not a win for feminism, but then you go and conflate ‘value’ with remuneration, and capitalism with patriarchy and corporatism. Capitalism is the engine of wealth creation which has raised standards of living the world over. And as standard if living has risen, those who are largely freed from concerns of filling immediate needs are much better able and more likely to be concerned about their environment.

Isn’t the root of the problem the fact that there is, and likely will always be, a fraction of the population which is sociopathically greedy for wealth and power? Nothing to do with masculinity and femininity per se, though likely a case can be made that testosterone fires aggressive behaviour. Look at your silly statement “Nobody has ever become a billionaire by being a mother, even the very best mother in the world”. Exactly the same thing could be said about being a father. And the second half of the sentence it was linked with, “capitalism was designed by men, for men, to value men’s qualities” is wrong on account of the distorting lens of resentment you are looking through. The function of capitalism is to put resources to the best possible use. There is no gender there. “The best possible use” is defined by the market, which is unavoidably complex, consisting as it does of the varying value choices of the populace. It isn’t perfect, but it is historically demonstrably better than any form of planned economy experienced to date, in terms of benefits to consumers and producers alike. Yes, the fruits and machinery of capitalism are susceptible to hijacking by the sociopaths among us. Democratic institutions are potential tools of these sociopaths and we will find corruption in the ranks of any bureaucracy. That the sociopaths and beneficiaries of the status quo are already in control and involved in securing and advancing their control of corporate and governmental institutions is pretty clear.

Your proposition that “all of humanity needs to change its valuing system to one which rewards feminine work as much as masculine” is bereft of specifics. What is feminine work? Empathy, collaboration, nurturing and peace are not the exclusive domain of women but of civilized mankind. The disproportionate role of mothers in raising children is a natural consequence of the biological nature of men and women and the logic of the more capable provider being tasked with the role of the hunter. The progression from hunter/gatherer to agriculturalist, then industrial worker, then knowledge worker has diminished the gender basis for defining ‘provider’. Yet still, the rearing of children is largely a team effort. In numerous families today, the choice is made to have one parent ‘stay home’. Usually this is the higher earner, appreciably often, this is the mother. There is scant basis for classifying a mother as a slave or contending that one who is not paid (for their ‘domestic services’) is unable to leave. Everyone one should have skills and abilities with which to earn a living for themselves (of course some are incapable). Taking a partner should not change that. If you are unprepared to deal with the give and take that is intrinsically a part of a marriage and/or of being a parent, you are quite free to remain single and/or childless. Economist Walter Block has revealed that childless women earn more than men already two decades ago.

As Adam Smith wrote “It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own self-interest. We address ourselves not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of their advantages”. His remarks apply regardless of gender. The division of labour is a universal principal and everyone benefits from it. If we were all sewing our own clothes and hoeing our own turnips, life would be unimaginably bleaker. The value of labour is situation specific. A lawyer remunerated at $150/hr is probably happy to pay her domestic worker $20/hr to avoid having to work fewer highly compensated hours in order to do housework herself. A mill worker earning $25/hr is likely to undertake home work himself and enjoy less leisure time, rather than pay a relatively high wage to someone else. To think that one should be paid for birthing and rearing one’s own children or doing your own housework runs counter to the basic principle that you are remunerated by what you do or produce for others. You own yourself, your skills, your knowledge and your time. You are the proper person to control how to use these resources. You have no right to demand that someone else give of their resources without mutual agreement involving some form of reciprocity.

You say that we are in a ‘toxic valuing system’ which only rewards women who can climb the ladder of the patriarchal paradigm. This is a vast overstatement and again is a view distorted by a lens of resentment. I vociferously resent the paradigm which allows vast profits and compensation from fraudulent financial engineering, crony capitalism, psychopathic military adventures, etc, etc. But it is clear to me that we are not talking about gender and its associated attributes, we are talking about basic principles of non-aggression and respect for the rights of others.

Keep up the good work researching and exposing the rot in our system. Tone down the anti-male tenor which is tainting some of your articles. It is too broad a brush.

inforebelscum/January 5, 2019

F. Foundling/January 5, 2019

As usual, an assumption is being made here, disconnecting capitalism from the noxious phenomena that naturally accompany it, such as ‘corporatism’ – among other things, by defining capitalism in an idealised ‘functional’ way that abstracts from its actual noxious results, and, of course, by blaming the noxious results of capitalism on democracy and the state in general. ‘Best possible use’, while rhetorically implying ‘best for humans’, is being literally defined as whatever the market does, and the notion that there is no other way to determine what is ‘best’ is again an article of faith that requires one to ignore the actually observable noxious results of the market. The idea that the emergent, unconscious result of the complex interplay of many people’s conscious individual choices is necessarily good for people – or what they would have chosen if they had had the opportunity to make a conscious decision about that result directly – is again a leap of faith contradicting the observable facts. In accordance with the dogma, the fair price of a certain type of labour is assumed to be whatever people are actually paid at the moment – in the case of women, apparently, zero. This is the typical output of an ideology created to defend injustice and the status quo.

It should be obvious that a person who is not paid and stays at home is unable – or far less able – to leave, since staying at home greatly inhibits that person from maintaining and developing the skills and abilities with which they can earn a living for themselves. And of course, both housework and childrearing is done for others. Birthing and rearing children are done not just for the children and the other parent, and also for society in general, which cannot exist without reproducing. The raising of a new generation is not some private business enterprise or hobby, it is essential for the survival of a society and should be rewarded by that society.

Greg Strebel/January 6, 2019

You write “The noxious phenomena which naturally accompany it”. No, it, capitalism, like just about any article or activity, is SUSCEPTIBLE to perversion, for which we must be on guard. I do not blame the perverse results of the misuse of capitalism on democracy. Rather I recognize that democracy itself is susceptible to perversion. ‘Your’ own Democrat vs Republican model is an appropriate example. This model lends the illusion of democratic control by the people, yet it is clearly hijacked by special interests using the opaque nature of the candidate selection processes to allow entrenched wealth and power to ensure that their perquisites are not constrained by any upstart ‘populist’. “Best possible use” terminology is shorthand for the spectrum of choices made by individuals, freely transacting, which is what a free market does. There is no “best for all humans”. That smacks of central planning and that indeed has noxious results. Yes, the value of anything is generalized as the price it will bring in a given situation at a given time. Anything that is not priced cannot be valued with a price. How can you say that women are paid zero? By law and in practice they are paid exactly as much as men doing identical work. The misleading 74 cents statistic does not factor in hours of work and other relevent factors. And how much do stay-at-home fathers get paid? Again, parenthood is a choice, no one is forcing anyone to make that decision. Couples embark on a joint enterprise to create a family for their own benefit. That this benefits society at large is good, but no one in a democratic society is having kids they do not otherwise want, for the benefit of society. This is completely as Adam Smith said of the butcher, brewer, etc. What each produces or provides is not done out of benevolence, but it has the excellent result of being good for all parties. So, are you arguing that because what is good for General Motors is good for America means that society (taxpayers) should fund GM over and above the benefits it obtains from its transactions? Of course society cannot exist without the populace reproducing. It also cannot exist without the farmers farming, the miners mining, the fishermen fishing, etc. The spouse who may stay at home is indeed getting paid, but in kind, via the efforts of the spouse who is providing the means for the food, shelter, clothing etc. These things are not free, they have prices denominated in currency. The choice as to who stays at home is made by the couple involved. Whichever spouse does so faces a similar risk of ‘inhibition of maintenance and development of skills and abilities with which they can earn a living for themselves”. Where is the injustice in that? It is not a gender issue today, in contrast to the antecedents. This subject is hardly a rational priority today when one takes a moment to reflect on the damage and lost opportunity inflicted on society by the predations of the power elite who continues to skim wealth from ordinary citizens and undertake wars of choice. The blood and treasure wasted on these plundering and destructive activities could have made society a virtual utopia.

inforebelscum/January 6, 2019

inforebelscum/January 6, 2019

FF, IOW, individuals should not be able to decide for themselves and should instead let others, their betters, do the deciding for them. Forced collectivism. No thanks.

And where exactly is the money supposed to come from to “pay” the homemakers? From the husband or the taxpayer? And why the hell is it anyone else’s business let alone the government’s?! Getting married is an individual choice and if two people agree to that decision then let them figure it out between themselves. But the leftist busybodies just cannot mind their own damn business.

JM/January 6, 2019

Harry S. Nydick/January 5, 2019

While I agree with most in the article, I would like to make a few points. First, though a man, I have never bought in to the masculinity value system explain in this article. I am one who has wants equality in all areas of life. That includes areas such as gender, race, ethnicity and so on – and is why I chose the cover of John Lennon’s imagine album to be my Facebook profile picture. However, I further hold that, in the U.S. at least, we must overturn that value system as well as our obsolete and corrupted political and electoral systems. The failure to do so will only serve to hasten our current slow slide toward totalitarianism. Though I can definitely be describe as a feminist, I am still able to be critical of females who deserve such criticism. Acting, in positions of power, like the worst of men do act, does not make a female more of a woman. it merely makes her cruel, greedy, selfish and worse. I’d rather she exhibit the better aspects of humanity. In fact, I’d say that that would generally tend to make her a better boss, leader, etc.

Ishkabibble/January 5, 2019

John Crisp/January 5, 2019

A lot of no true Scotsman fallacy here, combined with a heavy dose of essentialism. Who gets to decide what “true feminism” is? Actual feminism is much like any other political movement, changing with time and context, driven by the same impulses to power and control, but confined to one sex.

Carolyn L Zaremba/January 5, 2019

I have supported equal rights for women since I was 15 years old, in 1963. While I agree that women who raise children and keep homes should be rewarded for that labor, I still resist anything that claims that a women’s duty is to serve as an incubator, to provide humans to the state for that state to use most frequently as cannon fodder and not infrequently as slave labor. I vowed at a very early age not to let my uterus define me. I never wanted children and never had any. The myth that women are born with a “nesting instinct” or a “mothering instinct” is just that–a myth. I know men who have a greater “mothering” instinct than I have.

Old Joe/January 5, 2019

Whenever politicians like Hillary try to tell me that everything will be wonderful if only a woman is in charge, I would always answer back with two words. —- Margaret Thatcher

I’ve got no problem with women having an equal say in things as men, and it goes with that that women have as much right at the top job as a man. I just don’t believe that a woman is naturally better just because of that difference of a single chromozone.

Most of the time when someone is telling voters that they should be elected because of their ethnic heritage or because of their gender or because of their hair color, then the correct answer is to reject them entirely for putting forward such a meaningless difference as a reason for asking for support. Twice I’ve vote for women for President of the US. Rep Cynthia McKinney and Dr. Jill Stein. In both cases it was because I supported their program for change, and not because of their gender.

Carolyn L Zaremba/January 5, 2019

That’s exactly what I say, as well. To Margaret Thatcher, add Hillary Clinton. Two of the most evil witches of the 20th and 21st centuries. I will never vote for either the Democrats or the Republicans because they are both parties of imperialism and the ruling elites. I always and ony vote for the Socialist Equality Party.

Paul Gallagher/January 5, 2019

Love letters to the world, that’s what these are… Truth, honesty, vulnerability…this is love too. Your pieces help me pay attention to the people on the margins, outside of this value system. Thanks for clearing the way- blowing the mind numbing haze out of the way and exposing these nuggets of truth. Much love to you.

Mary Ballon/January 5, 2019

Joy/January 5, 2019

Ishkabibble/January 5, 2019

Hitlery proved without any doubt that women can be every bit as bad as “men”. She is absolute proof of the equality of the sexes. “We came. We saw. He died. Ha ha ha!” You’ve come a long way baby ……………. to get where you’ve gotten today!

psychohistorian/January 5, 2019

Those toxic values that you describe come from the God of Mammon religion (global private finance) that has a jackboot on the neck of all of the West and are trying to rule the globe.

This God of Mammon religion has poisoned our form of social structure for centuries and now is at the end of its run because China. Will the West embrace China and evolve into a multi-polar world or fight to the death of all of us that some have birthright to rule over others.

inforebelscum/January 5, 2019

Psychohistorian, women, just as much as men – if not more so, worship the god of mammon.

China is just as much into mammon as the West. But I do agree in having a multi-polar world. And that no person has the right to rule others hence my war on power which is the real fight towards a better world.

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"And ironically, years ago, when I first got into the FBI, one of the missions of the FBI in its counterintelligence efforts was to try and keep these people out of government." https://t.co/fh4ePI0j3B

Here's an Israeli government official calling Michelle Alexander's column in the NYT about Palestinian rights, based on MLK's philosophy, a "strategic threat," and warns that Israel will "treat it as such." How will Israel treat Alexander's column as a "strategic threat"? Creepy

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"NewsGuard is led by some of the most virulently pro-imperialist individuals in America and its agenda to shore up narrative control for the ruling power establishment is clear, writes Caitlin Johnstone."

NewsGuard is led by some of the most virulently pro-imperialist individuals in America and its agenda to shore up narrative control for the ruling power establishment is clear, writes Caitlin Johnstone. By Caitlin Johnstone CaitlinJohnstone.com The frenzied, hysterical Russia narrative being prom ... See more

Excerpt from "Fight The Establishment’s Narratives By Getting Clear On Your Own":

Anti-establishment movements are a mess. Whether they’re left-wing or right-wing, whether they’re statist or anarchist, whether they’re organized or decentralized, whether they place emphasis on official or unofficial narratives, any circle of people who are interested in opposing the status quo on a deep, meaningful level almost invariably find themselves significantly bogged down by confusion, paranoia, infighting, and misdirected use of energy.

Every day, for example, I get people in my inbox and social media notifications telling me I shouldn’t quote or share anything from this or that lefty journalist or anti-establishment figure because they’ve said something “problematic” at some point or have some kind of association with some aspect of the establishment. Rather than simply using narrative-disrupting tools wherever they come from to fight the establishment narrative control machine, I’m encouraged to isolate myself to the extremely narrow spectrum of voices which agree with my exact worldview perfectly. This kind of paranoid, self-cannibalizing mentality is rife throughout most anti-establishment circles.

This happens for a number of reasons, including the fact that the ruling power establishment will infiltrate dissident movements that it perceives as a threat with the intent of sowing confusion and division. But the underlying reason anti-establishment circles so often find themselves getting crushed by their own weight is ultimately because life itself is confusing and difficult to understand.

Hardly anyone holds a lucid and steady awareness of just how much of society is comprised of mental narrative. Most people live their lives under the unquestioned assumption that when they are moving around in the world, speaking, acting, forming opinions, having ideas etc, they are interacting with something that resembles objective reality. The truth of the matter is that most of the things which draw people’s attention in their day-to-day experience, whether it’s names, titles, news stories, political parties, economics, history, philosophy, religion or what have you, consist entirely of mental noises firing off inside human skulls.

Excerpt from "Fight The Establishment’s Narratives By Getting Clear On Your Own":

You might think it’s a big jump to go from chatting about the sociopolitical dynamics within dissident movements to making vaguely Buddhist-sounding observations about human thought, but it’s really not. The reason our species is in a mess right now, and thus the reason movements exist which seek to change the status quo, is because so much of life is dictated entirely by made-up mental narratives which can be easily controlled by the powerful, and hardly anyone fully grasps this. If they did, the revolution against the establishment would very smoothly and quickly succeed.

Scientific research has found that astronauts suffer problems with coordination, perception and cognition when they are unable to determine which way is up in space. There is no “up” or “down” when you’re outside the gravitational pull that our bodies are adapted to, so its absence sends our whole system out of whack. Navigating a society that is made of mental narrative is very much the same; if you don’t know which way’s up, you’ll get lost and confused. Before you can see the narrative matrix clearly, you might be aware that some narratives serve power and swat at them while you’re spinning through space, but you won’t have any solid ground on which to orient yourself for the purpose of forming a clear path forward toward a healthy and harmonious world.

Your first and foremost task as a revolutionary, therefore, is to find solid ground on which to plant your feet while operating within a swirling sea of narratives and counter-narratives. Without this you’ll find yourself expending energy on ineffectual agendas, chasing shadows, attacking friends and advancing the interests of the enemy as you stumble around trying to fight a threat you can’t even see clearly. You’ve got to figure out for yourself which way’s up.